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Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

It is edited by CFZ Director Jon Downes, and subbed by the lovely Lizzy Bitakara'mire (formerly Clancy), scourge of improper syntax. The daily newsblog is edited by Corinna Downes, head administratrix of the CFZ, and the indexing is done by Lee Canty and Kathy Imbriani. There is regular news from the CFZ Mystery Cat study group, and regular fortean bird news from 'The Watcher of the Skies'. Regular bloggers include Dr Karl Shuker, Dale Drinnon, Richard Muirhead and Richard Freeman.The CFZ bloggo is updated daily, and there's nothing quite like it anywhere else. Come and join us...

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Friday, July 25, 2014

The latest episode of our monthly webTV show from the CFZ and CFZtv, bringing you news on our activities within cryptozoology and natural history as well as the latest cryptozoological, and monster hunting news from around the world. I can't believe that we have done this every month for over six years now - 81 episodes. Golly!

This episode brings you:

CFZ in Summer
New faces
A bevy of newts
Rescuing a magpie
Rescuing a baby blackbird
Rescuing a vole
Fostering hedgehogs
A Yellow legged invasion
Weird Weekend 2914
An appeal for help
A mystery eel
Mystery caterpillars
Out of place birds
New and Rediscovered: New wallaby
New and Rediscovered: New sengi
New and Rediscovered: Rediscovered bat

1=.Cats of Magic, Mythology and Mystery by Karl Shuker(1)1=. Haunted Skies Volume One by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (-)3. Haunted Skies Volume Five by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (-)4. Haunted Skies Volume Six by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (-)5=. Haunted Skies Volume Two by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (3)5=. The Great Yokai Encyclopaedia by Richard Freeman (-)

What has Corinna's column of fortean bird news got to do with Cryptozoology?Well, everything actually!In an article for the first edition of Cryptozoology Bernard Heuvelmans wrote that cryptozoology is the study of 'unexpected animals' and following on from that perfectly reasonable assertion, it seems to us that whereas the study of out-of-place birds may not have the glamour of the hunt for bigfoot or lake monsters, it is still a perfectly valid area for the Fortean zoologist to be interested in.

The
saga of the westcountry beavers gets more complicated. They have been
reintroduced to Scotland, and there are plans to reintroduce them to Wales. In
Devon, at a secret location (which I believe is near Budleigh) there is a DEFRA
sponsored project to see if reintroducing beavers will help with flood control.
But these are all European beavers. The ones that have been living in Somerset
ever since a pair escaped in 1969, and other scattered individuals across the
country are Canadian beavers - a species which CANNOT interbreed with the
European species, and which outcompetes it wherever it has been introduced, as
has happened in Finland. It is unclear whether the ones which have turned up in
Devon, in the River Otter, apparently wild are European or Canadian. If the
latter, they should be caught and relocated, if the former why bother? I found
this picture http://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/update/2012-04-26/beaver-found-in-river-because-of-rising-water-levels/
of a beaver in the River Otter two years ago. Showing it to Lars Thomas, he
wrote:

"On that picture I can't say for certain - if only
the focus was a little bit better, I could be certain (Canadian beavers have
square nostrils, but European ones have triangular nostrils). But from the
general impression - the head seems very small and rounded, and there is a
tendency to a snubnose - this image looks Canadian to me. But again - I am not
certain. The differences are small, and the image is to much out of focus to be
100% certain".

So the plot thickens, and I for one, am finding it
completely fascinating.

* The Gonzo Daily is a two way process. If you
have any news or want to write for us, please contact me at jon@eclipse.co.uk. If you are an artist and
want to showcase your work, or even just say hello please write to me at gonzo@cfz.org.uk. Please copy, paste and
spread the word about this magazine as widely as possible. We need people to
read us in order to grow, and as soon as it is viable we shall be invading more
traditional magaziney areas. Join in the fun, spread the word, and maybe if we
all chant loud enough we CAN stop it raining. See you tomorrow...

* The
Gonzo Daily is - as the name implies - a daily online magazine (mostly) about
artists connected to the Gonzo Multimedia group of companies. But it also has
other stuff as and when the editor feels like it. The same team also do a weekly
newsletter called - imaginatively - The Gonzo Weekly. Find out about it at this
link: www.gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/all-gonzo-news-wots-fit-to-print.html

* We should probably mention here, that some of our
posts are links to things we have found on the internet that we think are of
interest. We are not responsible for spelling or factual errors in other
people's websites. Honest guv!

* Jon Downes, the Editor of all these
ventures (and several others) is an old hippy of 54 who - together with an
orange kitten named after a song by Frank Zappa puts it all together from a
converted potato shed in a tumbledown cottage deep in rural Devon which he
shares with various fish, and sometimes a small Indian frog. He is ably assisted
by his lovely wife Corinna, his bulldog/boxer Prudence, his elderly
mother-in-law, and a motley collection of social malcontents. Plus.. did we
mention the orange kitten?

1.Cats of Magic, Mythology and Mystery by Karl Shuker(-)2. MYSTERIOUS CREATURES: A Guide to Cryptozoology - Vol 1 by George Eberhart (-)3=. Haunted Skies Volume Two by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (6)3=. Haunted Skies Volume Four by John Hanson and Dawn Holloway (-)

5. Grave Concerns by Kai Roberts (-)

6=. Dinosaurs and other Prehistoric Animals on Stamps by Karl Shuker (-)

8=. The Mystery Animals of Britain (Kent) by Neil Arnold (-)8=. Terror of the Tokoloshe by S D Tucker (2)

US

1. The Great Yokai Encyclopaedia by Richard Freeman (4)2. When Bigfoot Attacks by Mike Newton (4)

3=. Big Bird by Ken Gerhard (4)

3=. Pygmy Elephants by Matt Salusbury (-)

5=.Journal of Cryptozoology Vol 2by Karl Shuker(4)

5=. Dinosaurs and other Prehistoric Animals on Stamps by Karl Shuker (3)

7=. Dragons: More than a Myth? by Richard Freeman (-)7=. Extraordinary Animals Revisited by Karl Shuker (-)7=. In the Wake of Bernard Heuvelmans by Michael Woodley (-)7=. The Island of Paradise by Jonathan Downes (-)

Last month's positions in thispinky colour, which I think is calledcerise. The slow sales are continuing. The politicians who claim we are out of the recession are, I believe, talking nonsense.

The hunt for British Big Cats attracts far more newspaper-column inches than any other cryptozoological subject.

There are so many of them now that we feel that they should be archived by us in some way, so we are publishing a regular round-up of the stories as they come in.

The worldwide mystery cat phenomenon (or group of phenomena, if we are to be more accurate) is not JUST about cryptozoology. At its most basic level it is about the relationship between our species and various species of larger cat. That is why sometimes you will read stories here that appear to have nothing to do with cryptozoology but have everything to do with human/big cat interaction. As committed Forteans, we believe that until we understand the nature of these interactions, we have no hope of understanding the truth that we are seeking.

The Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has reopened its 2014 scheme to fund badger vaccination in selected English counties, in areas close to high-risk bovine TB (bTB) hotspots.

First launched in April, the take up then was slow, with many farmers in heavily infected areas being sceptical about the effectiveness of vaccination as it does not address disease in already infected badgers.

However, also planned is a new Badger Edge Vaccination Scheme (BEVS) to be launched towards the end of the year, where the aim is to slow the onward spread of bTB from high risk areas, creating buffer zones to prevent the disease being carried out of the hotspots by sick badgers.

The move, welcomed by Care for the Wild and the Badger Trust, will fund the inoculation of badgers against the disease, and the training to administer the vaccine.

The government will be working with wildlife and farming groups to make the scheme work as a jointly funded, privately led project.

For any group to apply for the new funding their plan must, like the old scheme, involve two or more adjacent cattle farms in the Edge Area comprising Hampshire, East Sussex, Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Derbyshire and Cheshire.

There will also be other criteria such as undertaking to vaccinate across a minimum area and for a minimum number of years, but these details are still to be finalised.

Dominic Dyer, of the Badger Trust and Care for the Wild, said: “It’s great to see the government pushing ahead with this scheme. Care for the Wild and the Badger Trust were helping evolve a similar plan a year or so ago so it’s fantastic that this has taken shape and is being given the full backing of DEFRA.”

The National Farmers’ Union has also welcomed the launch of the scheme, but it maintained that diseased badgers still needed to be culled in TB hotspot counties to get on top of the disease.

John Royle, NFU chief farm policy adviser, said: “We’ve always said that we would support the idea of vaccinating badgers in the Edge Area as one of the measures to help slow disease spread.

“However, in high-risk areas such as Somerset and Gloucestershire we still believe controlling the disease in wildlife remains a crucial element of tackling TB and remain confident that the pilot badger culls will help deliver a reduction of TB in cattle in those areas.”